Harper lee uses different aspects or techniques to communicate her moral position .The one I am going to use Is character . I have chosen this because she could have based scout on a younger version of herself , i can support this from the fact that harper lee was born on the 28th of April 1926.Scout in to kill a mockingbird is around 7-9 which would correspond to when the book is based , which is in the 1930s .
Scout in the book is young and didn’t have the same moral position as most people as in she didn’t have a developed morality and was innocent ,which probably made her question the reason why people said things or did things . At the time the book was based and she was a child there was a lot of racism towards black people , which is what was observed by harper lee. Multiple different characters express their views in to kill a mockingbird. When Atticus is in court defending Tom Robinson he says something that I like and agree with :
“Thomas Jefferson once said all men are created equal , a phrase that the Yankees and the distaff side of the executive branch in Washington are fond of hurling at us. There is a tendency in this year of grace 1935 for certain people to use this phrase out of context, to satisfy all conditions . The most ridiculous example i can think of is that the people who run public education promote the stupid and idle along with the industrious – because all men are created equal , educators will gravely tell you , the children left behind suffer terrible feeling of inferiority .we know that all men are not created equal in the sense that some people would have us believe- some people are smarter than others- some people have more opportunity because, they’re born with it,some men make more money than others ,some ladies make better cakes than others -some people are born gifted beyond the normal scope of most men.”
This could have represented Harper Lee’s father’s opinion in some ways . Atticus is based on Harper Lee’s father , i can support this because her father was a lawyer( and a politician) , just like Atticus in To Kill a Mockingbird. This then means it is very likely that the opinions could be based on her fathers opinions . It is also possible that Harper lee’s ideas could be passed through Atticus in the book . the reason why i agree with the quote is because it is truthful ,even today it is still relevant . It could show that society has advanced , yet stayed similar in many ways . There is less racism then before and people still have prejudices, but not as many . The idea is that we should be treated equal ,but in reality we aren’t .it is an ideal that is very hard to achieve because of the divisions in society we have ie. class, race religion and politics , some countries are trying to achieve this .
Some of characters in To Kill a Mockingbird show the views or opinions of the people that they are based on , atticus is based on her father and it does show this , Scout is based on Harper Lee and shows the opinions that he had at the time or a simplified version of what she thought when the book was written .
React!